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In a frantic scramble last week to find a replacement for the Picnik.com closure on April 19th, I had written a post featuring 7 different FREE photo and graphic editing sites.
However, some many of my online friends were hoping to actually find a replacement editor that was similar or at least closer to the same look and feel of Picnik’s site. Is there such a site?
Well here it is! iPiccy.com is the closest you’re going to find to Picnik.com. The look and feel are more similar than any other site I’ve seen. iPiccy might actually be Picnik’s twin brother. Once you explore the site, you’ll see what I mean. iPiccy is 100% free, no registration required, and offers many of the same features and benefits that Picnik does and more.
Grabbing any image or photo is easy. Just click the appropriate button and GO! The editing options are endless and the ability to create some really cool customized graphics and images will be limited only by your creativity and of course your time and schedule. The workspace on iPiccy will be easy to navigate, especially for Picnik users, and will feel just like your old Picnik stomping grounds.
There are multiple effects with single click options at your fingertips. These will make your photos and images really “POP” and if you use a combination of the wide variety of tools and options available, the possibilities will be endless.
In literally minutes, you’ll be able to adjust your contrast, auto-correct colors, customize images, fix blemishes, remove red-eye, lighten and darken graphics, and even add text overlays, reflections, shadows and more. Having the ability to utilize some really cool effects without being a graphics designer makes iPiccy one of my TOP CHOICE recommendations and a great replacement for Picnik.
 Here’s a sample we just put together for a Valentine show promotion:
We added a border,
created a matting,
went with a sepia effect,
added a thick pencil sketching,
made it black and white,
re-sized it keeping constraints,
added a drop shadow border,
dropped some text at the bottom and saved to the desktop.
We then emailed it as a .jpg attachment to the event promoter.
This all took about 3 minutes from beginning to end.
Check out iPiccy.com and compare it to Picnik. If you’ve never used Picnik.com, then you’ll have discovered a very cool free online photo and image editing site that you’re going to enjoy. If you have used Picnik, and feel as though you’ll be losing a best friend come April, I can promise that iPiccy will make the hurt a whole lot less. In fact, I think some of you will like iPiccy better than Picnik. Happy creating, enjoy~
Check out these new tools for clients and prospects that work really well on ActiveRain, Wordpress, Blogger, Tumblr, Posterous, and your Websites. Providing valuable information, data, interactive tools, and great content on your blogs and websites will help you to cultivate, capture, and convert target prospects and visitors into clients. Here's just a few I thought you'd be interested in knowing are now available:
How Much Home Can You Afford? Get This Widget Here
What's Your Monthly Payment Going To Look Like? Get This Widget Here
Monthly Payment Calculator
Searching For A Home Is Fast, Easy, and FREE Get This Widget Here
REAL Time Information and Data Regarding Mortgage Rates Get This Widget Here
Find Real Estate Information ANYWHERE In The Country Get This Widget Here
Get Local Market Stats and Compare Information Get This Tool Here
(remember to replace my city with yours)
San Francisco Zillow Home Value Index
Check out these other 38 real estate widgets and tools for your blogs and websites. The FREE Co-branding option ensures that you stay front and center with your clients and prospects and reminds them who to contact when they're ready. Installation is easy, there's no programmers or designers required, and I'm only a comment, phone call, text message, or email away if you need help.
For all the old school folks, I still respond to smoke signals and carrier pigeons too.
It's been over a year since we launched Agent Ratings and Reviews.
Today we are leading the way with more than 100,000 reviews of local real estate agents submitted by our users. At launch, there were a few skeptics that felt that this could hurt an agent's business just as much as it could help, but, great service cultivates referral growth. Premier Agents with five or more reviews get more than twice as many contacts than agents with zero reviews.
Today, we're expanding Ratings and Reviews to all real estate professionals. All you need is a profile on Zillow and you immediately can start requesting reviews. Agents, lenders, title companies, stagers, inspectors etc., start taking advantage of this awesome opportunity to show off what it is that you do best!
Consumers typically write reviews to share their experiences about services, products, and people, but they're also reading reviews by others to assist them with real estate buying/selling decisions and in choosing their real estate team of professionals. Many agents and lenders are increasing their contacts and business using client ratings and reviews.
During a "Rating and Review" webinars, ActiveRain members Peggy Lyn and Chris Speicher from the Speicher Team shared the below email. This contact became a closed transaction and their client for life.
This new client also took the time to write a glowing review for the Speicher Team.
Testimonials & Reviews
Check out the Speicher Team ActiveRain profile and see how they're using "reviews" on their page.
Here's another great sample of how they're using Ratings and Reviews on their website.
Look how Jay Thompson, The Phoenix Real Estate Guy is using reviews: ReviewOurAgents.com
Erica Liodice from RealLiving.com shares how Ratings and Reviews are generating new business.
The Power of Consumer Reviews
Take a look at the screen shot below, it tells consumers a couple things:
1. The agent with reviews actually is working with clients selling and buying homes.
2. The agent's responses to the reviews are marketing opportunities to future viewers.
3. Agent's with large volumes of reviews translates as "many transactions" to prospects.
Check out these agents, many have more than 50 reviews. Start requesting reviews from your past clients, it's easy and the results will not only set you apart from the competition, the power of third-party referrals and endorsements are nearly as good as word-of-mouth referrals. Plus they stay online for others to see indefinitely.
Using the Facebook Apps/Tabs to populate your Facebook business pages with reviews is a great way to promote your five star service to social media channels. Adding a co-branded reputation widget on your blog and website also will attract additional contacts and produce visitors looking for reputable professionals to represent them in their real estate transactions.
I know that you stand behind the services and experiences you provide to your clients. I also know that consumers not only deserve this type of ratings and reviews service, they expect and even demand it. I'm very excited and pleased that so many members are benefiting from this feature and service.
There is so much concern and “Buzz” about Google shutting down Picnik.com, I decided to provide you with some alternative tools for editing and customizing your graphics, photos, and images. While Picnik.com will be shutting down in April 2012, here are some other options you have available immediately.
FotoFlexer – Create some dazzling photo and image effects in your browser for FREE. Use Animations, resizing, coloring, contrast and more. Take a look at These 5 Demo’s for a quick tour of what FotoFlexer has to offer, you’ll love some of these cool features. Smart Scissor is a favorite feature.
Pixlr – and for Picnik users, try Pixlr Express. You’ll love the Editor, the Pixlr-o-matic, the Pixlr Grabber for Firefox and Chrome browsers, and the Pixlr Imm.io hosting, all of which are very robust and user friendly cool features.
LunaPic – This site will rock your world! Lunapic offers more choices and options for photo editing and custom effects than some of the paid software applications I’ve purchased and used in the past. Use vignettes, color bars, animated imaging, picture frames, retro color, collages, custom text, reflection animations, slide shows, and a ton more. One of the most feature rich FREE online editors available. You’re gonna love this site.
FreeOnlinePhotoEditor – A really simple and easy to use photo and image editor for those “quick fix and gotta go” graphics. Very basic but simple and fast. Some of the other online photo and image tools include: OnlinePhotoTool.com: Online photo editor, Automatically resize your images when sending it by email, Create an Image from your RSS feed, Create Image from your Tweet and Twitter account, and Create, save and email screenshots.
BeFunky - Be Funky lets you do some pretty amazing things with your photos and graphics. Most of the features and tools are focused on creating cool, fun, and funky effects and artwork. The site’s name says it. Some of the effects available would take hours to create in Photoshop or other high end and costly photo/image editors.
Definitely worthy of a visit and tour.
Photoshop.com – That’s right, you can use Photoshop online and for FREE. You’ll need to register, but I promise it will be worth it. The Photoshop tools are powerful and very easy to use. Be prepared to spend a little time here, you’ll be amazed at what they have to offer and allow you to do online for free. I’m not going to lie, this is one of my favorites and my personal replacement for Picnik.com closing down.
GIMP – GIMP is very similar to Adobe Photoshop except that GIMP is FREE. It does require you to download the software but one huge benefit to that is it will never be bought and shut down on you. It is a very powerful and feature intense program so unless you’re really experienced with editing and graphic design, or you have more time than it takes to close a short sale, you may want to stick with one of the others.
I personally like to use GIMP for graphic design more than image or photo editing.
Combine all these together and you’ll have more FREE editing tools and features than you’ll ever need or use and absolutely FREE. Take a few moments to review each site, bookmark them, then give each one a try to see which one(s) best meet your photo and image editing needs. Enjoy!
Back in the day, a few of us discovered a really cool tool from Google known as "The Wonder Wheel" which helped members with keyword selection for their SEO friendly blog posts. Now that the Wonder Wheel is gone, I get literally hundreds of requests from members looking for good alternatives to enhance and better the "Keyword" content on their blogs, sites, posts, and blog titles.
Understanding The Importance of Keyword Searches:
Search engines like Google focus on returning the best quality and "Best Available" SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages) It's all based on what "Keywords" or phrases are being typed into the Search box. Search engines simply want to return the best available matching content based on both short-tail and long-tail keyword searches.
 The two things people search most are: the item, the person, the company, the thing or service, and then a geographic or what many refer to as a "hyper-local" location. Having this knowledge about search engines and keywords is the first step, the next steps will hopefully help remove the guessing game of...
"What are people looking for and typing in the search box of search engines?"
No pun intended (well, maybe a little...) SEARCH NO MORE! While we can never really be 100% certain of what people are searching and the exact keywords or terms they're using, these keyword tools will help you not only define what IS being searched on the web, but how and what keywords to be using when creating and refining your blog titles and blog content.
Keyword Tools for Your Blog
In the "Keyword Search" we typed "Real Estate in San Francisco" which seems like a pretty reasonable search that most web surfers would type if interested in looking at Real Estate in San Francisco. Interestingly the "Keyword Tool" came back showing that there is a larger percentage of people searching San Francisco Apartments which might make sense considering the space and demographic of San Francisco.
Maybe creating a Blog post with the Title "San Francisco Apartments" and then provide content on how those living in "San Francisco Apartments" could qualify for a great loan, with great rates, and possibly become first time buyers and first time homeowners. Would this be a worthy option and idea worth trying? This is just a sample of how you can use these Keyword tools to better your content, your traffic, and hopefully your business.
How should I use the Keyword Tool for keyword ideas?
Search for specific keyword ideas that are related to your business, product, or service. Or you can search a URL containing content relative to your specific niche, business, or service. You can also go straight to filtering out specific keyword categories. Use one or the other or both of them together; the keyword tool is very flexible and intuitive depending on how you choose to use it. Go ahead and try this:
- Use the Advanced options to refine your search, for example, by county, city, or neighborhood.
- Check or Un-check the keyword match type check boxes to refine your search.
- Select the Columns button above the results table to customize the columns you see in the results.
Give the Google Keyword Tool a Try
Check out the Google Keyword Toolbox
Soovle Is Another Great Keyword Tool
Soovle.com search multiple sites and returns most searched results on multiple platforms of your choosing. You can select from up to 15 sites at one time to get the most poplar searched "Keywords" or related "Phrases" on those individual sites. Here are the results as I started typing the keywords "Real Estate" when suddenly I realized that if I stopped typing, the Soovle tool kicked in and started solving...
I was personally pretty excited to see that on the Yahoo site, "Zillow Real Estate" was a pretty popular search by consumers and Internet surfers. (I do hope you have a profile setup on our site for those visitors to view)
SEOBOOK Keyword Suggestion Tools
SEOBOOKS Keyword suggestion tool cross-references Wordtracker.com, Google, and others. It displays links to related search results, semantically related phrases, and offers a new CVS exporting option which rocks. SEOBooks combined with Google Insights will provide you with a wealth of FREE data and information to set you on your way using "Keywords" effectively in your online marketing, advertising, and blogging endeavors going forward.
Check out SEOBooks, you won't be disappointed.
"The objective of a business website or blog is to attract potential buyers and convert them into paying customers. Keywords can help. Use appropriate keywords on your site and you’ll attract visitors who want to buy the types of products you offer." Source: Wordtracker
"Hover your mouse above for hidden message"
I'm always looking to provide better, faster, more efficient, and cost effective ways to help get the job done, but I'm only one grain of sand on a very large beach. If you find this content useful and worthy, take a second to reblog it. You can help spread the ActiveRain love across larger beaches much faster, and by doing so, you're helping to take the" "keyword" message further and make the process easier and better for those that might be following you or your blogs. Thanks. :-)
Spencer Rascoff, our CEO at Zillow, just posted this great article about the "Importance of Strategic Distribution" which discusses the hot topic of listing syndication. I'm excited to see the conversations and engagement that develop around this subject as it's one that I too am very passionate about. I find myself having conversations and discussions around this topic daily.
Thanks Spencer for posting this and for addressing head-on many of the industry and member issues and concerns. Definitely reblog worthy, I hope many others will reblog this too. :-)
Via Spencer Rascoff (Zillow):
It’s a new year, so what better time to take on a controversial topic: listings syndication. There is a lot of discussion about this in our industry, and I thought it was time to give Zillow's thoughts on this important topic. My comments below will also be the basis of my speech at this week's Inman Connect in New York.
First, let me emphasize that Zillow has a lot of usage. In December 2011, more than 23 million unique visitors used our websites and mobile applications. The primary reason they use Zillow is because of Zestimates, and the other unique content we have on our website. It is because of this traffic that nearly every major real estate brokerage in the nation puts their listings onto Zillow, for free.
Because the number of real estate websites has dramatically proliferated, real estate brokers and MLSs are now giving a more careful review of what sites they send listings to. I applaud this, as I think it is important to carefully evaluate which sites make the most sense. This trend towards "strategic distribution" is different from the more shotgun-like approach that characterized listings syndication for the last few years.
Strategic distribution is all about making the right decision on where to put listings based on criteria that makes sense for your business. Brokers own their listings, and can put them on whichever sites they choose. But in my opinion, brokers should carefully consider several important criteria when making these decisions:
1. Which sites are most likely to provide my listings with exposure to the most buyers. After all, that's what the listing agents and their brokers have been hired to do by their home sellers: get the house sold quickly, at the best possible price.
2. Which sites have business rules which are most acceptable to my brokerage.
Listings on Zillow receive exposure across Zillow.com, Zillow Mobile - the most popular suite of real estate apps across all major mobile platforms - and the Yahoo!-Zillow Real Real Estate Network the largest real estate network on the Web (according to comScore Media Metrix, 1), so clearly we have many millions of buyers visiting our website and using our mobile apps. Sellers benefit from their listing receiving as much exposure as possible.
Some in our industry have commented that although Zillow has more than 23 million unique monthly visitors to our websites and mobile apps, perhaps Zillow and other national media sites "don't have very much traffic in my area". That's incorrect. Zillow reviewed November 2011 data from comScore Media Metrix, the leading third-party source of website traffic information. Note that this data does not include traffic on mobile applications, where Zillow and other national brands have overwhelmingly more usage than others. Just looking at website statistics though, the Yahoo!-Zillow Real Estate Network is the #1 or #2 real estate entity in all 20 of the top 20 local markets in the United States (2). The data simply does not support the argument that "those sites aren't big in my area." [If you'd like to learn more about Zillow's traffic in your area, please email me; we will happily share Zillow's internal traffic statistics for your region.]
To emphasize the mobile point further, let me stress that not putting listings on Zillow, REALTOR.com and Trulia is tantamount to abandoning any hope of finding a buyer who is using a mobile device. In December 2011, Zillow had more than 36 homes viewed every second of every day on a mobile device. Zillow has leading real estate apps on iPhone, iPad, Android phones, Android tablets, Blackberry, Windows Phone 7, and Kindle Fire. Mobile usage accounts for about a quarter of all of Zillow's usage -- it's too important a channel for a seller or their listing agent/broker to ignore.
Brokers and MLSs should not only consider a website's traffic when making syndication decisions. But they should also consider how each website gets its traffic. At Zillow, most of our traffic comes directly to Zillow.com or Zillow's mobile apps, rather than coming to us through SEO. Our tens of millions of users are attracted to Zillow's unique content, including over 100 million Zestimates and 100,000 consumer reviews of real estate agents. We bring this traffic to the table in these syndication discussions; it's not like we showed up at the potluck with just a fork.
Putting listings onto top real estate sites is what sellers want, because it helps sell their homes. But don't take my word for it -- let's look at the data. Zillow data shows that homes which receive the top 10% of page views sell more than a month faster than their counterparts in the bottom 10% of views. Similarly, these highly viewed listings achieve sale prices closer to their asking price than those with less exposure. The difference is especially pronounced among homes priced less than $250,000. It's obvious, but if you give your listing exposure to lots of buyers, it will sell faster and at a higher price. The data proves it.
The Objections
I've already addressed one objection to sending listings to leading media sites: the local traffic stats.
The second objection I sometimes hear is that "the media site is selling my leads". Most major media sites (including Zillow) have free models which pass buyer contacts to the listing agent -- all they have to do to be presented as the first choice for buyers on their own listings is set up a free account and free profile on the site (which ensures that the buyer contact will get through to them).
In addition, some listings syndication services such as ListHub, owned by Move, Inc. (operator of REALTOR.com), have recently introduced dashboards to help brokers and MLSs understand different media sites' business rules, and decide which sites to send listings to. This allows the MLS to facilitate the efficient distribution of listings under the direction of the broker who owns the listings.
Diverse Solutions
No discussion of listings syndication would be complete without mentioning Zillow's acquisition of Diverse Solutions, the leading tech provider of IDX for websites. Many of you have told us what a great company, staff and products they have. But there are some conspiracy theorists who have speculated that Zillow will simply flip a switch and take all of the IDX listings through Diverse and put them up on Zillow.com.
It won’t happen and can’t ---due to contractual and legal reasons.
However, from the day the acquisition was announced, we started hearing from brokers that asked why they needed to continue to send Zillow a direct feed, when it was already coming to Diverse through their MLS. Therefore, if a broker wants us to use their listings from IDX, and their MLS agrees, then we will do this. We are in the midst of conversations with many brokerages and many MLSs about this, since it significantly reduces the complexity for the brokerage and it improves accuracy of listings on Zillow, which benefits brokers, agents and their MLS.
Speaking of listings accuracy ... Zillow invests massive resources in making our listings as accurate as possible, and it all starts with what’s provided to us by our partners. Complaining about accuracy while providing us with a less than stellar feed or no feed at all does none of us or our industry any favors. Those who decide to pull listings from sites like ours due to their own business reasons have the right to do so. But to take that step and then say a key reason was listing accuracy feels disingenuous when they have removed the very direct feed that is the most accurate, often leaving their agents to rely on less reliable options.
Conclusion
Strategic Distribution is an important part of a broker's marketing strategy. It is very important for brokers to put their listings where buyers will find them -- this is critical for agent recruitment and retention, and to help sell clients' houses.
It is for these reasons that nearly every major brokerage in the country has chosen to put their listings onto Zillow. We are very proud of our partnerships with companies like RE/MAX International, Coldwell Banker, Century 21, Windermere, Halstead, Prudential Fox & Roach and hundreds more.
I look forward to further discussion of this important issue, and I hope to see you at Inman Connect later this week.
Data Sources:
(1) comScore Media Metrix Real Estate Category Ranking by Unique Visitors, November 2011, US Data.
(2) comScore Local Market Key Measures, November 2011, Real Estate Category by Unique Visitors
My hope is to encourage anyone and everyone that reads this to DREAM BIG and then LIVE YOUR DREAMS!
What will you do with your future? You really only have two choices...
You can choose to just survive, or you can choose to succeed. Know this though, if you do choose to succeed, and you decide to prosper, and commit to focused and clearly defined goals, then anything is and will be possible because YOU were born to succeed! Your very BEST can still be in front of you.
YOUR future is in YOUR hands. Inside you is untapped potential. You have unlimited value and your dreams can definitely come true but ONLY if you believe they can. You are unique and very special which NOBODY can ever take away. You can achieve whatever you put your mind to so choose to enlarge your vision.
Retrain your brain, increase your confidence, attract the GOOD around you, and seize the profitable opportunities in and around your path. Step forward daily and positively engage relationships. Unleash your maximum wealth and don't forget to "DECIDE WHAT YOU WANT!"
Prepare for your success and believe in yourself.
Plan before you do anything. Ask questions and question everything. Avoid the negative and move outside of your comfort zone. Let go of the past and remember, NEVER GIVE UP!!
Share this with anyone you know that might need a bit of encouragement and inspiration in these challenging times. It might make a difference in their day . . . and maybe, just maybe . . . their entire year!
I wish the VERY BEST to you all in 2012~
Incentives offered by sellers at closing are nothing new to the real estate industry.
Sometimes it’s as simple as leaving that beautiful pool table behind, rather than moving it out of the basement. Or, it’s the seller agreeing to fix the front porch, or repaint the pink bedroom that the future buyer just can’t get past as they dream of a new in-home office.
Seller-funded incentives have also gone to extremes. It wasn’t too long ago that everything from a free car, boat, and luxury trips could be included in the mix.
Incentives are back and have become a bit more realistic. Perhaps they are back to their true purpose, which is as a valuable marketing tool that can draw attention to a listing while providing an added benefit to the buyer.
In October, Zillow introduced "Special Offers" to address this need and it’s already having a positive impact on agents who are taking advantage of this new marketing tool. More than 1,000 listings have a seller-funded cash incentive attached, which provides added visibility on Zillow, among other benefits.
The early results for those agents that are participating in the program are promising. Listings with a Zillow Special Offer are currently receiving 10 times more buyer contacts than listings without.
Tyler Rygmyr, with Revolution Real Estate in Nashville, is already a fan of the program. “I learned about the Zillow Special Offer program late one evening, so I ran a special later that night on a listing that had been on the market for 9 months. Several scheduled showings happened immediately thereafter, and an acceptable offer was submitted within days. Pretty cool!”
Let me know if you have any questions or if you need more information about seller-funded incentives, I'd be happy to show you some great examples of how other agents are using these "special offers" in their areas.
Many Facebook Business page owners want to automatically add their Blog posts to their pages. While this can no longer be done on your Facebook personal profiles, it CAN BE DONE if you have a Facebook Business or Fan page. NetworkedBlogs created a Facebook app that allows you to now add your Blog posts directly and automatically to the Facebook page(s) of your choice.
The first step is to make sure you have a Facebook Fan or Business page. If you don't have one, Create A Facebook Business Page or Fan Page here first. Once you have a page created, you can run through the following step-by-step instructions to add almost any blog content from any site to your Facebook selected pages.
This should also work nicely with your ActiveRain blog content if you choose.
You'll want to visit http://Facebook.com/NetworkedBlogs to begin the process. For detailed step-by-step instructions including the screen-shots that you'll need to do this, I've created a 12-Step Blog to Facebook Tutorial that will walk you through the entire process.
Some of you may not want your posts to appear on your Facebook pages and that's ok too. If that's the case, you might still find this tutorial helpful and useful to share with a friend or associate when they ask you how to do this? This is what Bernadine Hunter from ActiveRain asked me, I hope this will help others too.
Instructions - How To Add Blogs To Facebook
Is your Real Estate Marketing Plan ready and in place for 2012?
This post might be useful in helping you determine where to best spend your time and money for maximum results. Online and offline, you're going to need a business plan with goals. Here's a great article and resource to help get you started.
Via ActiveRain Corp.:
Real Estate Marketing Plans
Do you have your real estate marketing plans for 2012 ready?
With SO MANY alternatives for real estate marketing plans, are you confused on what to do in 2012?
So as you develop your 2012 real estate marketing plans, here is some great food for thought:
ActiveRain, the largest blogging platform and professional social network in real estate, conducted a survey of 1,910 real estate professionals asking the simple question of "what is the most effective real estate marketing or advertising that you do?"
The results:
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Referrals (including word of mouth and sphere of influence) were overwhelming the most preferred marketing with 26% of responses.
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Blogging was #2 with 13% of responses. (Keep in mind that the survey was conducted on ActiveRain, so these results may naturally be skewed to blogging).
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Direct Mail continues to be incredibly popular. Direct Mail includes post cards, mailers, and newsletters. Direct Mail also received 13% of responses.
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Internet Marketing as a general category received 12% of responses. Our assumption is that Internet marketing is generally speaking pay per click marketing on Google, Yahoo or Bing or lead generation from a number of different sources.
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Networking Networking includes partner referrals and face-to-face meetings. Face-to-face networking received 8% of the responses.
(Share these stats - link to this article: http://activerain.com/blogsview/2641172/real-estate-marketing-plans-most-effective-marketing-of-2011)
As you can see based on 2011 real estate marketing plans, real estate professionals continue to favor more traditional offline, "tried & true" hand to hand real estate marketing techniques. Though the general bucket of Internet marketing & blogging are equivalent to direct mail, the top marketing techniques tend to be more offline - referrals, direct mail, networking, working with past clients, open houses, door knocking and cold calling. Hard to know if ActiveRain is the same as blogging and if Zillow or Google are the same as Internet marketing, but interesting to see that from a response perspective, that Open Houses are more popular than any one web site AND Door Knocking is more preferred than CraigsList and FaceBook.
When real estate professionals were asked, "What is the most effective real estate marketing or advertising that you do?" only a small number of real estate web sites were mentioned in reasonable frequency: ActiveRain, CraigsList, FaceBook, Zillow and Google. Of course, blogging and Internet marketing are large categories with a lot of different companies. But there were very few mentions of Wordpress or other ways to market online. Noticeably absent were Trulia and Realtor.com Though we believe ActiveRain is a very powerful blogging platform, fans of ActiveRain are likely over-represented in the survey. Kudos to Zillow to have name recognition equivalent to Google in the real estate industry.
For 2012, here are the key questions to ask:
- How important is developing your REFERRAL BASE? How are you going to do it?
- Are Blogging and SEO part of your 2012? If so, what to do - ActiveRain, Wordpress, Blogger, or other?
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Direct Mail continues to be an important part of the real estate professional's marketing mix. It is amazing, but true. Direct Mail allow neighborhood targeting unlike online marketing. What kinds of direct mail campaigns will you be using?
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Internet Marketing needs to be part of your 2012 marketing mix, but there are a lot of options from pay-per-click advertising to lead generation to Zillow, Trulia and Realtor.com
ActiveRain is great place to start the learning process to figure out the best Internet marketing strategies to achieve your personal and financial goals in 2012!
Share this blog post! Either blog about it or share on your social networks. Link to and reference this blog if you use this content: http://activerain.com/blogsview/2641172/real-estate-marketing-plans-most-effective-marketing-of-2011
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Brad Andersohn
Fairfield,
CA
More about me…
Zillow - Outreach Manager
Address: I am always Mobile, but right now I'm in, Fairfield, CA, 94534
Office Phone: Zillow.com
Cell Phone: (707) 646-1876
Email Me
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